Early History of Humanity

CHAPTER XIII
Early History of Humanity

Evolution of the Black World Insofar as the known facts permit, we shall try in this chapter to retrace the major stages in the evolution of the Black world since Homo sapiens appeared on the scene. In addition to providing a reference system for the young African researcher, the picture thus presented, with its inevitable gaps, its uncertainties, but also its areas of clarity, will give him an idea of the seriousness and magnitude of his task. I have directed my efforts to the period of the African past ranging from- prehistory to the appearance of modern States at the end of the Middle Ages, for this is the span that poses the greatest number of problems for understanding the history of mankind. Priority of the Negro Factor in the History of Humanity The results of archeological finds,1 especially those of Dr. Louis Leakey in East Africa, enable us every six months or so to penetrate more deeply into the obscurity of the first rough outlines of humanity. Thanks to dating methods based on the dosage of potassium 40/Argon, we can go back 1,700,000 years. Nevertheless, there is continued agreement that Homo sapiens, modern man, appeared about 40,000 years ago, during the Upper Paleolithic.

This first humanity, belonging to the lower layers of the Aurignacian, was probably related morphologically to the current Black type of humanity. The characteristics of that Grimaldi race have been summarized as follows by Marcellin Boule and Henri Vallois in Fossil Men, translated into English by Michael Bullock: When we compare the dimensions of the bones of their limbs, we see that the leg was very long in proportion to the thigh, the fore- 260 Evolution of the Black World 261 arm very long in proportion to the whole arm; and that the lower limb was exceedingly long relative to the upper limb. Now these proportions reproduce, but in greatly exaggerated degree, the characters presented by the modern Negro. Here we have one of the chief reasons for regarding those fossils as Negroid, if not actually Negro. The Negroid affinities are likewise indicated by the characters of the skull. These are large; the crania are very elongated, hyper-dolichocephalic (indices 68 and 69) and, seen from above, they present a regular elliptically shaped contour, with flattened parietal bosses. The skulls are also very high, so that their capacity is at least equal to that of the average Parisian of our day: 1,580 cubic centimeters in the case of the young man, 1,375 cubic centimeters in the case of the old woman. The mastoid apophyses are small. The face is broad but not high, while the skull is excessively elongated from the front backwards; so that the head might be called unbalanced or dysharmonic. The forehead is well developed and straight; the orbital ridges project only slightly. The orbits are large, deep and sub-rectangular; their lower border is everted toward the front. The nose, depressed at the root, is very broad (platyrrhinian). The floor of the nasal fossae is joined to the anterior surface of the maxillary by a groove on each side of the nasal spine, as in Negroes, instead of being bordered by a sharp edge, as in the white races. The canine fossae are deep. The upper maxillary projects forward in very marked fashion. This prognathism especially affects the subnasal or alveolar region. The palatal arch, though only slightly developed in breadth, is very deep. The jaw is strong, its body very thick; the ascending branches are broad and low. The chin is not greatly developed; a strongly marked alveolar prognathism, correlated with the upper prognathism, gives it a pronouncedly receding appearance. The majority of these characters of the skull and face are, if not Negritic, at least Negroid.2 . . The other types found in Europe probably belonged to the Cro-Magnon race: the Predmost man (in Moravia) and the Brunn man (near Vienna) were perhaps Cro-Magnoids with "Ethiopian" characteristics. . .. Such are the facts revealed by archeology. On the strength of this evidence, we must recognize in all objectivity that the first Homo sapiens was a "Negroid" and that the other races, white and yellow, appeared later, following differentiations whose physical causes still escape science. Refusing to accept these facts,